HTC to Finally Stop Making So Many Goddamn Phones

HTC has a problem. It realises it's addicted to new phones. And if HTC's execs make good on recent words, we may no longer be drowning in a torrent of the company's new models every other week. Effing finally.

HTC easily makes some of the strongest and most interesting hardware out there—its Titan Windows Phone is one of my favourites ever. But the Titan is the case in point, as only a couple months later, the Titan II is already headed our way with only marginal spec boosts. People who bought the original are likely going to feel screwed, and those who haven't purchased either are likely going to feel confused.

The confusion sets in as soon as you look at HTC's offerings. Let's take a gander! From HTC.com:

HTC Sensation XL

HTC Explorer

HTC Rhyme

HTC Sensation XE

HTC Titan

HTC Radar

HTC Sensation

HTC Evo 3D

HTC ChaCha

HTC Salsa

HTC Impressive S

HTC Desire S

HTC Wildfire S

HTC HD7

HTC 7 Pro

HTC 7 Trophy

HTC 7 Surround

HTC 7 Mozart

HTC Desire Z

HTC Desire HD

HTC Aria

Sweet Christ—those are only the phones currently available. I need a valium after writing down that list.

Meanwhile, Apple puts out one iPhone at a time, once a year, with prominent, profound upgrades from model to model. Well, except for the 4S. But still. The scattershot approach cheapens HTC's efforts, and far more importantly, makes it harder for all of us to find the coolest new phones.

But TheNextWeb reports a change of heart (or return to sanity) on HTC's part:

"We have to get back to focusing on what made us great – amazing hardware and a great customer experience. We ended 2011 with far more products than we started out with. We tried to do too much.

So 2012 is about giving our customers something special. We need to make sure we do not go so far down the line that we segment our products by launching lots of different [phones]."